Incident playbook generated in real time from disaster recovery plan extractions

Abstract

Systems, methods and procedures enabling an incident planner to build and distribute disaster response playbooks to be used by incident responders. Information is excerpted from multiple plan documents (such as disaster recovery, crisis management, business continuity, or emergency response plans) that includes only what are the essential personnel contacts, tasks, and resources needed at time of disaster.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A method for an incident planner to specify an incident playbook that contains information pertinent for incident responders to use in response to a disaster event comprising:
 extracting information from disaster recovery, crisis management, business continuity, and/or emergency response plans pertaining to the type of disaster;   storing the extracted information as data objects arranged as the incident playbook;   associating event and incident responder specific information with at least one of the objects in the incident playbook;   updating the event and/or incident responder specific information; and   distributing the information in the incident playbook to the incident responders at a time of disaster with the updated information.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1  wherein a distribution channel for distributing the information is selectable by either the incident planner or the incident responders. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 2  wherein the distribution channel is an email message, a short message service message, a mobile application, or a web page. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1  additionally comprising:
 selecting objects in the incident according to the specific class of incident responder. 
 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 3  wherein the class of incident responder depends on a role of the incident responder. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1  wherein the objects in the incident playbook further comprise one or more of:
 a list of tasks to perform at the time of disaster; 
 a contact list for the incident responders; or 
 a list of resources needed by the incident responders. 
 
     
     
         7 . A data processing system for maintaining information pertinent for incident responders to use at time of disaster comprising:
 user interface software, for operating a server processor to perform the steps of
 extracting information from disaster recovery, crisis management, business continuity, and/or emergency response plans pertaining to the type of disaster; 
 associating event and incident responder specific information with at least one of the objects in the incident playbook; 
 updating the event and/or incident responder specific information; and distributing the information in the incident playbook to the incident responders at a time of disaster with the updated information; and 
   a data object storage device, for storing the incident playbook as a set of data objects representing information extracted from the plans.   
     
     
         8 . The apparatus of  claim 7  wherein the objects in the incident playbook further comprise:
 a plan summary object including information take from two or more of the plans; plan content, taken from two or more of the plans; and
 information provided for the user interface by an incident planner.